


Always Focused (Rolander Fanfiction)

by patrick_kohai



Category: Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch (Video Game), Ni no Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom (Video Game)
Genre: Falling In Love, Fanfiction, Fluff, Gay, Gay Character, Gay Male Character, Gay Sex, I Will Go Down With This Ship, Love, M/M, Romance, Spoilers, Yaoi
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-15
Updated: 2021-03-04
Packaged: 2021-03-12 23:08:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,400
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28768335
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/patrick_kohai/pseuds/patrick_kohai
Summary: After defeating Doloran in their final battle against his Kingmaker, the team living in Evermore are left with nothing to do. Especially Roland and Leander who seem to have a lot of downtime and no way to spend it.I really ship these two ;-;This is post ending of the game so don't read if you don't want spoilers!
Comments: 7
Kudos: 7





	1. Study Session

The troupe formed out of unprecedented circumstances and found themselves at the end of the reign of terror that came from Doloran and his Kingsmaker: The Horned One. For once it felt as though the six of them had nothing else to do other than wait for the next big drop and those only come once a lifetime, don’t they?

The kingdom of Evermore had never had a chance to be more enlightened, bustling, or prosperous before the defeat of their sworn enemy, it felt as though the lands of the Revenant Kingdom had finally come to peace with one another. The only thing left for our heroes to do was to take on some much needed relaxation. On this particular day, the young, grimalkin king found himself at the mercy of the Chief Consul’s governmental lessons.

“Soon enough, Evan, you’ll be required to elect a parliament of sorts to act on your behalf when we are all too busy to do so. Additionally, we’ll want to have a Chief of Finance and you’ll want to decide on your military head. It’s not really wise to make every decision yourself. Especially when we factor --”

Evan dropped his head to the oaken table and groaned loudly. “Goly, Roland, can we do anything other than lessons today? My head is still aching from yesterday.”

Roland smiled softly at the nature of Evan’s adolescence, having to remind himself that he really was still a child and maybe packing his brain with information was taking a toll on him. 

“It’s important that we go through this...there’s no better time to get ahead then when everyone else is away. There are too many distractions otherwise.” 

Evan turned his head towards Roland taking notes beside him. “I miss Tani though! She always helps me to understand all of this nonsense you’re having me learn…”

Post the battle against The Horned One, the team decided it was time for everyone to take a bout of vacation for a few weeks. As it stood, Tani and Batu had their own kingdom to run, all of Bracken’s family still resided in Broadleaf, and Leander took this time to do his own research in Goldpaw’s library.

"Tani won't be back for another week or two. Neither will the rest of the team. Is there something I can do to help you focus?" Roland was desperate to keep his pupil's attention, they'd really only just started today's work even though it was approaching dinner time. He could feel his own attention span running thin...

Evan thought on this a moment as he traced the lines of age on the wooden table. He smiled hugely at his grandiose idea. "Could we visit Leander tomorrow? It's been a few days since he left and I wanna know what he's studying!" He perked up and watched Roland with a hopeful expression. Leander hadn’t devulged as to why he wasn’t visiting Hydropolis or Nerea for their vacation time, but it wasn’t like Evan or Roland to pry into his personal life.

He sighed softly, not out of frustration, but out of bemusement at the sudden outburst. "I suppose I could ask him. If I do, will you finish reading the chapter I assigned you for today?"

There wasn't much of a question to be asked, they both knew Leander wouldn't mind having visitors.

Evan nodded vigorously. “I will, I promise.” He eagerly reached for his study material on kingly edict and began diligently reading.

"Good, I'll get us some tea then." 

Roland made his way out of their study room and headed towards the kitchen to scope out a nice pot of tea. He was so used to travelling around the world with the contrasting group of heros that sitting around teaching Evan served quite the challenge. He found himself at the mercy of stagnation and restlessness from not having any quests to achieve. The vacation was definitely important for the team to finally be able to move on from the dangers of Doloran, but it left Roland without a sense of purpose it seemed. He’d pushed Evan into a formal class setting to force some sense of normalcy into both of their routines.

He made his way to the entrance of the kitchen and eyed Floyd (their resident chef) humming away over a floured work station.

"Hey, Floyd. Could you help Evan and I out and prepare a pot of tea? We're in the conference room." 

Floyd smiled brightly looking over his shoulder at him. "Of course, I'll have it up in a jiffy along with some dinner. No need to set the table with just the two of you around."

Roland nodded. "Yeah it's extremely quiet without Bracken and Tani yelling back and forth. Thank you, Floyd." He slowly walked back toward the conference room, pulling out his Leafbook tablet as he went.

In this realm, cellphones weren't exactly invented (you had your memoliths, your tablets, and in Broadleaf you might even find a walkie talkie or two), but you could in fact contact someone through their Leafbook account which served as an instant messenger. Roland did his best not to post too much on there for fear of revealing his private writings, but it did help when he wanted to check in on the rest of the team.

_Hey Aristides, it's Roland. Uh, I guess you know that already ---_

Roland backtracked the message and sighed unsure of how to not come off as awkward. He wasn’t the best at that.

_Hey Leander, Evan and I were wondering if we could help you study tomorrow? Bring you lunch?_

He sent it before he could second guess the verbage again; it always felt awkward around Leander and nothing Roland did could help him explain why. They got along quite well considering how drastically different their lives were. They agreed on almost everything concerning Evan and they both planned the attack against Mausinger many months ago, so why did it always make his headspin when they were working together? He felt this inherent need to impress someone like Leander that couldn’t just be explained away.

Roland shook his head, stepped his way back into the study, and took his seat next to Evan. He stared at the words written in his notebook suddenly becoming extremely bored by the idea of continuing their work. Evan on the other hand was doubled over his textbook diligently taking notes and humming to himself. Roland smiled softly at his change in attitude.

Floyd pushed through the doors of their work room with a luxurious cart filled with a steaming hot kettle of Crabapple Tea and an assortment of triangle cut sandwiches. 

"Just what the king ordered! Here you are, eat up before it's too late now." Floyd placed the tray on the table before them. “I’ll be on my way.” He left just as quickly as he entered.

"Oh my goodness! Thank you, Floyd! This looks amazing!” Evan dove right into the sandwiches, taking bites in between flipping the page of his book.

Roland poured the both of them cups of steaming, hot tea and added sugar as he stirred it all together. Just as he finished and passed the second mug towards Evan, his Leafbook lit up on the table alerting him to two messages.

_Of course you two can come. Bodley won’t stop pestering me about having you come up with Evan to visit anyhow._

_And I’ll gladly take you up on the offer for lunch._


	2. Pot Stickers and Parallel Worlds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (Heyo! For sake of this fanfiction (and my sanity) this is set in a timeline where the movie doesn’t exist and Roland never makes it back home. I hope this doesn’t become confusing and I’m able to explain what the characters do or don’t know about. If it is confusing please leave a comment about what I could improve on! Thank you for reading!)

Evan and Roland went about their next morning without a hitch. Morning turned to afternoon and they both decided it was absolutely time they made their way towards the city.

"Easy enough, we can go by trip door! Bracken took the zeppelin to Broadleaf with her, so short of us walking there, this is about all we have to go on." Evan pointed this out in between stuffing a satchel with necessary items for their trip to Goldpaw. He was repeatedly expressing to Roland how much he hoped they'd have time to tour for a day or so. 

When Roland wasn't busy listening to Evan go on about the afternoon they were going to have, he found himself messaging back and forth with Leander. The Archon sent a letter to The Highroller Pugnacious and the innkeeper notifying them of their visit (wanting to make sure all kingly formalities were in order). Leander surmised that a proper royal invitation would go over quite well if they planned to do any sightseeing.

"Sounds like a plan, Evan." Roland was smiling happily to himself while typing a response back to his wizardly friend. Leander was making especially sure that they knew of how thrilled Boddly was they were coming (she always was the overzealous type).

“Come on, Roland! I wanna get going!” Evan was practically jumping up and down with anticipation. He stood off to the corner of the entrance to the Evermore castle awaiting Roland to join him. He had his magic wand at the ready for them to cast the trip door spell.

The older man stepped over to him, placing his hand on the small of Evan’s shoulder, so they wouldn’t get lost in the trip door system (that had happened once before on a quest meant to send them to Ding Dong Well, they’d ended up in Niall’s forest instead!). With a small gesture with the tip of the wand, they were flying off into a sparkling field of electric blue. The air around them had the consistency of fog and before either of them could register the space around them, they were already standing at the grand entrance of Goldpaw.

Trip doors always had a way of causing Roland to experience motion sickness (it didn’t matter that they’d travelled all around the world by this very system) each time he had to breathe heavily in order to stabilize his turning stomach. Slowly his vision came to a steady halt and just as he remembered the Great Gate came into view; the shimmering ponds on either side, intertwining oriental dragons, and adorned bridges leading to intricately designed shops. It reminded Roland of a small gamblling town he’d once visited in a populated area of China back home. Everything around them screamed for their undivided attention which painted a picture of exotic means of fun. 

Evan grinned at the familiar sights. “Come on! I wanna stop and get something to eat at one of the stalls!” He grabbed for Roland’s wrist and pulled him over the wooden bridge leading into the bounds of the city. 

The older man chuckled softly (now being fully recovered from the trip door) at the king’s enthusiasm for a day planned for tea and endless piles of books. They passed by long rows of shops each of which had a unique way of enticing the passersby to peer in and contemplate making unneeded purchases. The pair found themselves at the foot of Sweet Saffron’s Tea House; the aroma of confectionaries, hot coffees, and steamed dumplings surrounded the both of them beckoning their coffers.

Roland looked behind the dog-woman standing behind the counter to peer at the menu.

“Come on! Eat Up! What can I get for you today, my guests?” She leaned over the counter in anticipation.

“Um...can we get a to-go order of Hot Tip tea and an array of Dice Dumplings…”

“Oh, oh, and three Potluck Potstickers!” Evan was practically bouncing up and down beside him. “Leander loves how big they are and the filling is delicious!”

Roland pulled out his coffer pouch. “And three Potstickers, please.”

The woman nodded as she put each item into bags for them, carefully wrapping it all up with a taut, red bow, and passed it to Evan’s awaiting hands. Coffers were exchanged for their packaged goods, sending them along the pathway to their destination at the library.

Roland and Evan passed through the threshold at the entrance to Boddly’s library landing them at the short hallway into the heart of the impressive collection. Books were pouring out of every crevice of the shelves: each one adorned with interesting titles about kings, tales of old relics, or children’s adventure books. Leander could be seen in the far corner of the study taking detailed notes on whatever he must’ve been researching.

Roland managed to take a singular step towards his friend before being completely blocked by the boding and boisterous Boddly. The stench of scented rose and clary sage burned his nostrils causing him to take a step right back to his original position. They both had to stop themselves from pinching their noses shut from the awful aroma.

“Welcome! Welcome! Dear, pretty things! Welcome! My bookie-wookies are yours to devour! Enjoy! Mmm! Yess!" She smacked her cherry red lips together as she said this. 

Roland grimaced through tight lips. “H-Hi, Boddly. A pleasure as always to see your -- uh -- radiance. We’re here to see Leander.”

She shimmied her shoulders in excitement causing her robes to sashay a bit (notably dispersing the scent even more). “Oh, dear, oh, dear, yes! He’s been here every day for nearly a week! I knew the two of you couldn’t stay away if he was here!” She winked in Roland’s direction.

Evan smiled charmingly at her. “That’s what I said! We’re here to help him study and get a tour through the city!”

“Oh, most certainly it seems. You two go on ahead to him now. Let me know if I can help you, dearies.” She ambled off towards her own work-station no doubt to bother a few other patrons.

The pair approached Leander’s table that was covered from edge to edge in well-worn books and memoliths. There were research papers pulled up on a few of the tablets and a notebook scribbled in the mage’s sloping handwriting. The wizard himself was leaned over meticulously scouring over what appeared to be a compendium of children’s tales. He looked up as Roland stepped into his peripheral vision.

Leander pushed up the glasses on his nose and smiled warmly at them. “Well, hello you two. What a most mischievous pair you make.”

Roland crossed his arms and leaned against the edge of the table obstructing his note taking. “I could say the same about you taking up an entire section of the library by yourself.” He smirked at the atrocity of his desk.

“Don’t start now, Roland, you’ve been so nice to each other lately!” Evan scolded him. The grimalkin set the packaged lunch on the wooden surface a safe distance from the books. “We brought food just like we said we would.” He grinned a toothy grin at the wizard.

Leander’s eyes lit up at the mention of sustenance. “Thank you. I really hadn’t realized how famished I was until Roland told me you guys were planning to stop by last night.” He pulled apart the wrapping as he said this releasing the steam from the tea kettle and pot stickers.

“You haven’t eaten since last night??” Roland asked in bewilderment.

He poured himself a small cup of tea in his own empty cup. “Since yesterday morning actually. The innkeep insisted on sending me off with a bowl of Gotta-Fly-Flakes even though I told her I wasn’t hungry.” He sipped the tea.

“Goly, Leander, please eat! We brought you dumplings and potstickers, so have as much as you want.” Evan began helping himself to the spread before them. 

“Thank you, I’m going to.” He chewed softly on one of the dumplings and went back to reading his book.

Roland settled into the red, plush chair right beside him joining them in their feast. After a few moments of silence filled with turning pages and tea sipping he spoke up. “So what’ve you been up to these past few days?”

Leander seemed startled by the question (almost as if he forgot there were even people around him). “Uh...I’ve been researching how you were able to cast a gateway spell to our world without meaning to...I’ve also been trying to find out if it’s possible to get you home.” He didn’t look up as he said any of this choosing rather to stare at the tea leaves in his cup.

“Well, for starters, I never casted any spell. That’s not possible in the world where I come from actually, I just appeared in front of Evan during the coupe.”

Evan picked apart his potsticker. “Yeah! I remember you were very confused when you realized there was magic and higgledies and monsters all about this land.” He chuckled to himself. “You even asked if my ears were real.”

Leander nodded as though he’d already thought all of this through. “I’m aware of that...but something must’ve triggered the connection between our realms, right? The closest thing I’ve come to putting it into words is by use of a gateway spell. It’s really quite powerful, especially considering you can’t really wield magic at all, Roland.”

“It’s also interesting that I seem to be the only one this has ever happened to...we haven’t encountered anyone who’s experienced anything close.”

The wizard grinned. “See, that’s where I think we’re wrong.” He scooted his chair closer to Roland and set the large children’s book between them. “I’ve been reading this fable about a boy named Oliver. The story talks about a boy in strange clothes landing in our world during a time of ‘great peril’.”

Roland peered over the wizard’s shoulder to read more about what he was talking about. “Evan, do you remember the King’s Maker Trials you had to go through last summer?”

Evan nodded vigorously, nearly spilling his cup onto the table. “OH! I do! The entire trial was based upon the fable you’re talking about, Leander! But...what does any of that have to do with this? It seems completely unrelated.”

The wizard nodded again. “I thought I’d heard the story before reading it in this book as well, that makes sense. The reason this is important is because Oliver is said to have come from a parallel world. His soul was entwined with one from our world. He’s the only documented case of experiencing this type of connection.”

Roland contemplated this a moment, paging through the book as he thought. “Yeah, but it’s just a fable, I don’t follow how this is helpful towards trying to get me back home…”

Leander winced a bit at the last part. “A lot of fables have some vein of truth in them and I thought it might be an avenue to explore considering we have no other leads. The gateway spell has been lost to the world of magic for some time now...”

He looked over at Leander’s shaking hand holding the other side of the book on their lap. “I really do miss my old life at times...if it were an ideal situation I’d want to be able to travel between the worlds at will, but that seems a little impossible…” He grazed his fingertips over the engraved photos in the book.

Leander pushed up his glasses again and peered over at his friend. “I know it must be hard not knowing if you’ll be able to go back ever. I want to help you figure this out if I can. I’m not certain you could do it all on your own.”

By this time, Evan had wandered off into the depths of the library a bit ago to retrieve his own study materials and walked up just as their dismal conversation started. “Roland…” Tears welled up in the grimalkin’s eyes. “You’re not really going to leave Evermore are you?” He clutched the book against his chest as a shield of sorts.

Roland looked up at him sadly. “I won’t leave you by yourself, Evan...”

The mage smiled softly at him. “I should hope you wouldn’t want to leave any of us behind.”

He became embarrassed by being put on the spot like that. “Well, yeah, right now I can’t leave at all, so that would include the team.”

Three of them spent the remainder of the afternoon paging through their study materials attempting to commit the fables to memory. The time flew by and before any of them realized it, the library was coming to a close and they were no closer to understanding the gateway spell or Oliver’s parallel world.

**Author's Note:**

> (A/N: I just want more people to ship these two nerds)


End file.
